Pets play an important role in many peoples lives, and consequently many pet owners will go to considerable lengths to treat their pets for major illnesses, such as cancer. Cancer is one of the major forms of mortality in pets such as cats and dogs, and therefore the pet owners desire ways of treating this disease in their pets to increase their longevity. Such treatments ideally would be not only economical, but also practical for owners rather than veterinarians to administer to the pet.
Present methods of treating cancer in pets focus primarily on surgical resection of solid tumors. Surgery is expensive, and moreover, is not suitable treatment for many cancers. Among these are leukemias and lymphomas, where surgery obviously is not an option, but this class includes highly disseminated malignancies as well as ones with poorly defined margins or those arising in inoperable locations.
It would therefore be desirable to have a way of treating cancer in dogs and other pets that could be administered routinely by pet owners and that would not be resisted by the pet. Ideally, such treatment could be administered with the pet's food.